Comments on: Master Blaster

By: Fish

Fish — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 02:10:50 +0000

I live in the Hutt and will investigate the African Home Videos for ya’ll

By: hamish

hamish — Sun, 06 Jul 2008 02:11:40 +0000

Poneke’s right, but pretty much every media outlet in NZ has been repeating the “independence from UK” line, along with pretending there are only two countries in Africa.

The wonderful Mr Wonder is playing here Oct30th! Woohoo!

By: Robyn

Robyn — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 05:11:30 +0000

Oh, I was but a wee girl at the time, and I got my history from, um, not Wikipedia but some inadequate blog. Thanks for the fact-check/history lesson.

By: Poneke

Poneke — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 00:48:22 +0000

Back when that song was written, Zimbabwe had just won independence from the British and Mugabe was going to usher in a new era of strength, hope and, uh, peace.

Eeek I hate to nitpick, especially on such a nice blog, but I need to correct your history.

Zimbabwe had not “just won independence from the British” back then.

What happened was, that in 1965, to avoid idependence being granted, the Ian Smith-led white minority colonial regime of what was then called Rhodesia, unilaterally and illegally declared its own independence, which led to Mugabe and others forming their own independence movements.

There was basically civil war there until 1980, by when Smith had capitulated and free elections were held and Mugabe won.

But you are right, the script wasn’t meant to go like it has done since. Mugabe has grown increasingly deranged and destroyed the second-most prosperous African economy south of the Sahara, leading to untold, and muchtold, misery.

By: Stacezilla

Stacezilla — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 00:40:18 +0000

Please enter into other mysterious Naenae locations such as the picturesque Olympic Hotel. Take a camera…

-S

By: Robyn

Robyn — Sun, 29 Jun 2008 09:47:19 +0000

Please note: I have not been in the Fax Photocopy Laminating African Home Videos shop. It is in Naenae, which I generally don’t spent a lot of time in.

One of my workmates alerted me to the presence of this sign, and it was agreed that a photo should be taken.

But if I get back to the Naenae shops, in all their mid-century splendour, I will investigate.

By: hamish

hamish — Sat, 28 Jun 2008 00:34:27 +0000

Are they Nollywood videos? We’re needing further research!

By: Jon

Jon — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 10:45:04 +0000

“African home video” ?! please tell me.

By: harvestbird

harvestbird — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 10:13:44 +0000

In the film Paradise Now, there is a popular video and photo store in Nablus, on the West Bank. The proprietor sells and rents out farewell videos from suicide bombers about to go and do their deed, and (forced) confessions of collaborators before their execution by their people. He tells one of the main characters (who is off to do a suicide bombing) that the collaborator videos are far more popular with customers than the so-called martyr videos.

None–none–of which gives me any further clue as to what the content of an African Home Video might be.